• Hello!

    Either you have not registered on this site yet, or you are registered but have not logged in. In either case, you will not be able to use the full functionality of this site until you have registered, and then logged in after your registration has been approved.

    Registration is FREE, so please register so you can participate instead of remaining a lurker....

    Please be certain that the location field is correctly filled out when you register. All registrations that appear to be bogus will be rejected. Which means that if your location field does NOT match the actual location of your registration IP address, then your registration will be rejected.

    Sorry about the strictness of this requirement, but it is necessary to block spammers and scammers at the door as much as possible.

A spider of some sort in substrate??

NyanNyan

NyanNyan

Nyeh
I've been so worried about my new corn, Tomato, that i've been searching everyday for something in her viv but I didn't know what. Now today I turned over one of her hides and found a red spider about the size of um.... a fourth of a dime (small coin) and killed it. I then emptied out the viv which contained repti bark (
repti_bark.NEW.gif
) and I am wondering if I was using the wrong substrate and thats what caused the spider? Should I worry about this? Now I have heavy duty paper towels in there and plan to keep it that way. Is this okay?
 
Oh and I have looked all over her body for mites and ticks but see nothing. I still think it was the substrate that attracted the spider, what do you guys think?
 
Probably the substrate. Next time put the bag of substrate in the freezer for a day or two before putting it in.
 
Yeah, and Repti bark has a reputation for having bugs in the bags. Do what Jason says and you should be ok with it, though.
 
just out of curiousity...

do any of you place new bags of Aspen Bedding in the freezer to be on the safe side...?!
 
I never had a problem with aspen having bugs but I had a bag of Repti Bark that had a ton of little white bugs in it.
 
so... how do you deal with the substrate that has insects living in it when i already have it out of the bag? Let it soak?
 
I threw mine away but I think you can heat it in the oven to kill the bugs.
Hopefully somebody will know the correct temperature and length of time to "cook" the bark.
 
Ah, me being the stupid one i put it in a bucket of water to soak. I'm not using it anymore tho. Paper towels are suiting my needs now anyway. Plus I can see the feces much better this way.
 
NyanNyan said:
so... how do you deal with the substrate that has insects living in it when i already have it out of the bag? Let it soak?
Click to expand...


Personally, I would toss it - to be on the safe side...
 
We have this huge freezer in my house so everything goes in there for a while. I put all the aspen and eco earth in there just to be safe.
 
What exactly is eco earth? So is aspen a better bet than repti bark? Can i still keep her in clean sanitary paper towls?
 
Eco-Earth is a shredded coconut bark substrate. It looks a lot like dirt. I've used it in the past, and still use it for my ball python, but my snakes seem to prefer aspen.

Aspen is definitely a better bet than reptibark.

Yes, paper towels will still work fine. I've had my problem child Scarlett on paper towels almost since I got her and she is doing just fine.
 
NyanNyan said:
I've been so worried about my new corn, Tomato, that i've been searching everyday for something in her viv but I didn't know what. Now today I turned over one of her hides and found a red spider about the size of um.... a fourth of a dime (small coin) and killed it. I then emptied out the viv which contained repti bark (
repti_bark.NEW.gif
) and I am wondering if I was using the wrong substrate and thats what caused the spider? Should I worry about this? Now I have heavy duty paper towels in there and plan to keep it that way. Is this okay?
Click to expand...
i have nature bark......it seems fine :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top